Ergh. I keep having the warehouse dream.
To explain: in the warehouse dream, I'm bagging grass seed in my dad's warehouse, and for some reason I just can't keep up, and I fall further and further and further behind until I wake up. It's frustrating, and I spend my whole dream trying desperately to catch up, and getting nowhere. And then, to quote a really lame joke, I wake up exhausted. I seriously do.
Totally different topic: am I the only person who doesn't especially enjoy church services? Keep in mind, this isn't a knock on anyone in my church who's reading this. But that said, I go to church Sunday after Sunday, and come away wondering what in the world I was doing there. And it's implied that I should “come away blessed” after every single service.
I go, I sing the songs, sit in the pew and listen to the preacher . Generally, I sing nothing that I haven't sung 100 times already, and hear nothing that I haven't heard plenty of times already, in a version of the Bible that was made nearly 400 years and is hard to understand. And I walk out afterwards exactly the same as when I walked in. Sunday after Sunday, week in, week out, nothing changes (usually).
Why?
And more to the point, what should be done? Should I:
Grit my teeth, go anyway, and hope that it gets better eventually?
Try to find a church where I do indeed “come away blessed” every Sunday?
Something else?
Without any cliches, what say you, my loyal readers?
**edit** One thing here quick. Just for Mom's peace of mind and so that she doesn't have concerned older people questioning her about the state of my soul,* what I wrote isn't
always true. There's exceptions to everything, this included. And also, what I'm talking about here is the preaching/congregational singing aspect. I'm not talking about Sunday school, youth functions, or anything like that.
*Which is what apparently happened after I wrote
this.
Comments (8)
Once again thank you for your honesty! I suspect that many of those folks that equate honestly working out your salvation with an endangered soul are so deep in their rut of religious tradition that it never occurs to them that you are seeking something that they too could use
To answer your question, you need to know what God wants you to do. Are you in the church where HE wants you? Boredom really isn't an indicator that you are in need of a new church. Also how do you prepare yourself for church? Are you like alot of us rushing out he door to skid into Sunday School just as the opening prayer reaches the "Amen"? If so, can you rework your schedule so that You can have a time of worship BEFORE you leave home? I've read articles about beginning preparation for Sunday on Saturday night. Some of the components were practicle, like be sure all the clothes you want to wear are clean and ready to go. Some ideas were more along the lines of spending time focusing on God. Praising Him for WHO HE IS! No personal pronouns. Just God you are_____. And fill in the blank with as many of His attributes as you can come up with in 5 minutes or so.
Then at church, can you stop and think about even one of the songs. What inspired the writer of the lyrics? What message is the song trying to convey? Do you take note s on the sermon? Doing that really helped me get alot more out of the service. As for the 400 yr old, hard to understand translation of the Bible, can you bring a newer translation with you and re-read the scripture in that? I know God never changes, but language does. Remember that the KJV was an attempt to put the Bible into the language that people spoke, not to create THE translation for the rest of time.
Thanks for sharing your journey with us
Prayers
Rai
That's an frightfully practical question for me. (Ditto to the alternates.)
I suspect it (and they) may be for you as well.
Disclaimer: I've been wrong before.
not in the mood to get into what you said in your post, although it was some food for thought.
i'm tagging you.